Venture Competition Team: Invested Energy

April 16, 2013

JJ England

Aaron Lindenbaum

Peter Stein

Team members:

JJ England, law student

Aaron Lindenbaum, law student

Peter Stein, law student

Griffin Stevens, law student

Project synopsis:

Invested Energy matches crowdfund investors with clean energy projects. We provide low-cost capital to project developers and owners, enabling individuals in the community to earn returns from investing in local sustainability projects.

Demand for photovoltaic (PV) power has grown in a down economy thanks to a huge reduction in PV panel and equipment costs, and installed U.S. capacity is set to grow 146 percent from 2012 to 2016. But debt financing for small and medium-sized clean energy projects is hard to come by. Project debt is generally provided by a limited group of banks that lend only to projects larger than 10 MW. This leaves an untapped market of small and medium- sized clean energy projects in need of debt servicing.

Invested Energy aggregates small loans through an online crowdfunding platform to finance the construction of clean energy projects for places like schools, homes and community centers. By partnering with local developers to match high quality projects with low-cost debt financing, Invested Energy repays investors with interest as a project produces power. Invested Energy fulfills a niche that directly promotes the rollout of clean energy and enables investors to take an active role in their community by earning returns on safe, local infrastructure investments.